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I used to be a work-aholic! I still kind of am.. but I have to say I have been much better about actually taking time off to be with these girls. After all, that is why I wanted to be a virtual assistant to begin with!

We like to be lazy in this house on our days off. Wake up when we went, eat when we want, and stay home all day. Heck, sometimes we don’t even get out of our jammies!

Now that I’ve gotten used to this time with them, I refuse to let it go. We play more games, craft, make messes, clean them up, but most importantly, we just spend time together.

As you can see, since Payton is at home with me all day, she likes to plan to go out all the time. Emma on the other hand, doesn’t mind doing absolutely nothing for a while 😉

Like this:

I’m always trying to find things for Emma that are not only fun but also educational. Here is one of the things that we’ve gotten her that she’s absolutely falling in love with – but also makes Mommy happy too!!

Instead of just playing garbage on our phones we try to pick games that are entertaining but also going to help in some way. There’s this awesome download we found called Touch ‘n’ Sing. It’s a a free download and then you can pick which games you want to add on for a really low price! (it comes with two free games!)

I love having apps on my phone to keep Emma entertained in situations she’d be bored. Like at restaurants when we are waiting to be seated, or in the car on a long trip! Emma tends to ask for my phone a lot during the day and I don’t mind handing it over at all since we have options that are educational.

Each song on this app is interactive! She’s either popping balloons or she is making the characters move to the song. I think my favorite thing is that it fits into any age stage! There’s a little bit for everyone in here. Whether you are teaching your little one words, letters, or your older one lyrics to songs – it is pretty darn entertaining!

Like this:

This weekend was full of surprises and accomplishments! Saturday I spent the day in Front Royal celebrating my cousin-in-law’s baby shower. She looked gorgeous, the party was a blast, and she got so many awesome goodies!!

She ordered us the Young House Love book for the book signing we are going to! I AM SO EXCITED 🙂 This is one of my favorite blogs and I’m so impressed with how far they’ve come. (A little jealous too 😉 haha!)

Sunday we spent celebrating Brian’s birthday. The boys went to see Skyfall and the girls went to see Pitch Perfect (which was HILARIOUS!), then we went to Buffalo Wild Wings for dinner. That place seems to be a family choice when the eight of us go out. After that we came back to our place for brownies and cookies for desert.

As soon as everyone left Brian was so excited to play with his big birthday present:

We rigged up a system of tables and chairs for him to play with it, which made him want the chair to go with the driving set even more. I’m not looking forward to storing that sucker but I know he’ll get his use out of it so I’m biting my tongue 😛

Surprisingly with all the things we had going on this weekend I got a lot accomplished too! I made a bunch of new cozies to list in my shop:

Loving all the color options that would be great for Thanksgiving dinner tables 🙂

I also started on making some boot cuffs:

It’s almost done and then I have to make a matching partner 🙂 I’m excited to pass these around to my friends and family to try them out and let me know what they like and don’t like about them.

On top of all that I’ll be starting to sell some of my cousins newborn hats in my shop! She’ll be sending me her creations soon – check out some of her goodies:

My little girl is growing up so fast. So much so that we are now considering buying her big girl games! Brian and I were talking about things to keep her entertained on car rides as well as at night when we are laying around together as family. She usually steals my phone and plays games and watches shows on it but I’m kind of tired of sharing it!

So we’ve decided to upgrade our little girl with her own electronic device made by leapfrog – but we are trying to decide between two choices. The cheaper version: The LeapFrog Explorer:

Or the more expensive route: The LeapPad2

What we really wanted was something travel friendly, easy to carry, not many pieces to lose, and something obviously entertaining for Emma. Right now we are leaning toward the more expensive one just because it seems to offer a bit more options.

Anyone have any opinions? I’d love to see what other people think of these items!

Love Always,

J

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Last Thursday my husband and I went to Wolf Trap to see the National Symphony play a tribute to Zelda and the Goddesses within the video game story line. Each year we try to go to Wolf Trap at least once to see whatever they have that’s video game related. We’ve been to the Video Games Live event in 2009, and watched the Symphony play Final Fantasy in 2010 -which if you don’t know, has one of top if not best music to the game. We missed out on last years event but I have a feeling we won’t be doing that again 😉

The symphony played a wonderful array of music going from the original Zelda and on to now but of course they had to start with the theme song ;). It was amazing to see such a huge crowd at an event like this as well as the ones in the past. It’s obvious that the gaming industry has done so much for it’s followers and there are so many dedicated ones who enjoy these events so much.

Even though the video and computer games I play are limited and very much on the girly side – I still enjoy watching Brian play these and 99.9% of the time I know the characters, story line, music, and exciting parts of the game just because I get lost watching him play 🙂

Video games will always be a big part of our lives and I’m hoping that when we move out into a new home that Brian will let me have some say in decorating his man cave. I’ve always wanted to create a room dedicated to him and what he loves as well as find a balance with the design part of me. I’m thinking gray’s, black’s, white’s, with the pops of color from his posters. Maybe even some chevron pillows!

I started out with a paper towel roll, marked it with a highlighter every once inch and cut with scissors (it probably would have been more precise and neater cuts if I had used an exacto knife – I’ll try that and let you know later if it’s better) then I painted them black, let them dry, bent them a little to make a flower-like shape and glued them together. I have MUCH more to cut out to make it look how I want – but it’s a good start!

What I’m hoping mine will turn out to look similar to:

Other things you can do with paper towel holders:

Next up! Puzzle pieces! My mom is a huge puzzler so we always have puzzle pieces around this house up for stealing 😉 I laid out all the puzzle pieces I wanted to use and painted and painted and painted white. It took five layers to get them solid white and I still would do a layer or more because I’m that picky 😛 After they dry I picked seven pieces, one for the back to keep it all aligned and glued six more pieces in a circle. Add a ribbon and it’s complete!

This is what I hope the final pieces looks like:

Other things you can do with puzzle pieces:

(This is a guest “book” everyone signed the puzzle pieces and then they put it together and framed it! SOO COOL)

Hope you enjoyed today’s crafts! I have a few new ones coming soon so you’ll have to stay tuned if you’d like to see what I do with these two next things!

This is a rocking chair that has been passed down from generations on my mom’s side. I’m going to clean it up, add a piece of wood for the seat, some batting, and fabric to make it cute for Emma 😀

This is an old lamp that was given to me to do whatever I please with 😀 I LOVE IT! I’m going to prime it, spray paint it, add a new lamp shade and make it modern and new!
Thanks for stopping by! Now go get crafty 😉

I’ll go ahead and start off by saying that I never go shopping on Black Friday and if I do – I don’t leave the house until 2:00 pm when I’m positive the crazies are gone 😉 This year was a different adventure for sure!

I start out at 10 pm yesterday waiting outside of GameStop with my husband to get him a 3D Nintendo DS. As we were driving there I was holding my breath because I was pretty sure this trip would scar me for life! When we get there we were pleasantly surprised that we were the first ones! As more people showed up in the line the more we all got to talking and laughing. I’ve never had more fun waiting in a line before than this time. It helped that everyone has the same thing in common – a love for video games and excitement for getting a good deal!

After being first in line and having such a good experience I started thinking that I can handle this madness!!

I went to bed that night (morning) woke up eight hours later, ate breakfast, got ready and decided to head to JoAnns for some Christmas shopping with my mom and mother-in-law! My mom and I have decided since I was high school that it’s just easier to go shopping together and buy each other our presents together that way we each get something we really want instead of having to guess! So shopping we went. After getting there and realizing that the fabric deals were too good to pass up – I decided to stock up on my materials for the craft shows for next year and stock up I did!

Right there is roughly around 150 yards of fabric. I could have bought more but I limited myself!! If you’re not sure why I went all out – let me just explain to you.. Solid Flannel at retail price costs $5.99 + Decorative Flannel at retail costs $4.99. Normally this amount of fabric would have cost me about $800 dollars which I obviously don’t have to spend right now! How much did I save? Since all the flannel was $1.99 plus we had a 25% of all item coupon – we saved over $600. I’ll be set for the year 😉 That’s just a price you can’t beat!!

So where I swore I’d never be a Black Friday crazy person – I now am committed to being a Black Friday Crafty crazy person. 😀

Wow! I was swamped on Wednesday. Both the girls came to play ALL day! I don’t think I have played as many board games, card games, coloring, puzzles, and so much more in such a long time! By the end of the day I was sitting on the couch and realizing that although I may feel completely exhausted right now, in the long run it gives me more energy on the days that I don’t have both girls. I could really use some more energy to get more things done 😉

Yesterday I took the day off since both Monday and Wednesday I had both girls I figured a day off would be a nice treat. I finished the blue scarf and decided that I needed to make each scarf a little bit longer so I am going back to each one and added on a half a skane. I finished the white one and I think I am going to do the bright blue one next!

My order of new yarn came in, it’s like 14 skanes of yarn 🙂 and as soon as I get my next paycheck from babysitting I am debating on spending it on some more yarn or some new things for the house. I am going to have so much spending money from babysitting that I am not going to know what to do with it! I am already putting 95% of it towards the down payment but the rest of the 5% is more spending money then I have EVER had. EVER.

It’s amazing how much my life has changed and I am loving every second of it!

After holiday plans and remodeling our living room I am back on track! B designed a built-in entertainment center that he wanted and him and my dad got to work and made it happen. It’s crazy that it looks EXACTLY like B’s drawing to the T. We owe my dad huge, not only is he an amazing designer, but he amazes me on his building skills too. This is probably why I have always been super excited when it comes to designing and crafting things. He always took my picture and made it come to life. He see’s the thought that I have and finds a way to make it reality. I love this man.

Well here’s how it turned out:

It turned out so great! As you can see B is already enjoying it playing video games 😉

And now that things are settling back down I’ve gotten to play with some of my new toys like my new paper-cutter!

I am loving all the extra room now that the TV and video game stuff has its own place!

Next on my list to do is finish my first book on Nook that B bought me for Christmas, work on T’s blanket, make a window seat cushion, throw pillows, new curtains, and a few other things 🙂 This year is going to be seriously crafty!